"The World"

I've increasingly noticed that people talk about the "world" when they mean "human society" (e.g. "Can Bono save the world?"). The verbal conflation of "human society" and "the world" might be both sign and symptom of the larger megalomania that is imperiling important parts of the world.

Orthodox Jews - None or Few?

"Are you Jewish?" That's what the squinting smiling flocks wanted to know. They didn't ask any brown-skinned people. And they didn't mark those they asked, which left those of us without evidence of our shared African heritage to be accosted yet again by the next mob of monomaniacal monotheists.

The young man offered to affix his lips to a pale and somewhat twisted phallic symbol that they described as a "schafer" and blow it, if I agreed that I was Jewish. The symbolism seemed creepy.

The first would-be blower buttonholed me in the library. I checked with them their definition of "Jewish". To these hoi polloi of Hebrew quoters, it was a simple matter, "If your mother is Jewish, you're Jewish." But how can I be sure that my mother was Jewish? "If her mother was Jewish, she was Jewish." But how would I know if my grandmother was Jewish? Do you know if your grandmother was Jewish? "Yes, she is." Well but what about her grandmother's grandmother's grandmother's grandmother's grandmother? What was her name? How far back does your recorded genealogy go? How can you be sure that HER mother was Jewish?

If he hadn't been confused about my argument (aren't these people known for studying arguments?) he might have blown his schafer right there in the library! Is nothing sacred?

The second set, who had caught me just outside the library wandered off after counter-attacking my knowledge of my own family's comprehensive genealogy. Luckily they didn't ask for details, because there's dirt there that's already been dug up.

These interactions led me to believe that by the black and white definition of the black and white clothed Jews, that there were no Jews. But before publishing this important news of autogenocide-by-logic of an historically important ethnic group I checked with a Jewish friend of mine, who has been cast out of his family for marrying a non-Jew.

He said that there are accepted conversion ceremonies whereby a non-Jew can actually become a Jew. So a non-Jewish woman can become Jewish and her children are thereby Jewish. Unlike a man who wants to convert, she doesn't even have to allow the rabbi to cut off part of her genitals. Although the immersion ceremony might seem like a hassle (at least bloodfree for women), it does guarantee membership in a group that sees itself as the chosen people of G-d! We can see here that Orthodox Judaism offers an inviting cosmopolitan alternative to some rival groups that claim to be the chosen people of G-d. I'll bet the Aryan Nation doesn't allow conversion ceremonies! Nonetheless my friend's wife chose not to become part of that chosen people (or any other). And so his parents hardened their hearts and cast my friend and his wife both out. Actually they probably cast their son and his wife out of their hearts, and THEN hardened their own hearts to make sure that their son and his wife wouldn't sneak back in.

Despite my sympathy for my friend, I feel mainly relief that I didn't recklessly report the sad result of Orthodox inattention to an almost infinitely regressive self-identification. (My friend says, "It isn't infinite - it only has to go back to Moses.")

I could now announce that there are no Orthodox Jews, with the exception of those Jews whose mothers weren't Jews, or whose mother's mothers weren't Jews. Lacking perfect pedigrees to the days of desert wanderings, would-be Jews must concede that the only certainty comes from conversion ceremonies. I expect that there will be a wave of worried would-be converts if the weakness of the matrilineal records becomes widely known. If they could get their great-grandmothers or grandmothers to convert it would be a lot more efficient. Even with all the kvetching from the alter folk it would probably would be simpler than re-thinking the whole culture. I'm worried though that the "zeal of the convert" might multiply the mercilessness of the sanctimonious self-appointed guardians of identity, as demonstrated by my friend's parents. Maybe its best if we African-descended folks of all colors just let the Orthodox Jews go on thinking they're already Jewish.

What We Can Learn From the 9/11 Clean-Up

There was a lot of confused emotion clouding the air during the immediate aftermath of 9/11/2001. I remember hearing anti-Jewish conspiracy theories, watching varied responses to fighter planes flying all over town (where were they a few hours earlier?), and reports of Sikh and Muslim people being beaten. There were estimates of over 10,000 dead. I remember the grey wind pushing its load of ashes and chemicals away from my apartment in Midtown, across the East River and towards Brooklyn. I also remember that a day or two after, there were first tens, and soon thousands of flyers with pictures of loved ones and expressions of hope that the loved ones had made it out of the towers, or could be rescued in the rubble.

It was in that context that fire-fighters, construction workers, and many others went down to the site of the wreckage and tried to dig people out. They did manage to save a dozen or so (according to reports I read later) but I remember them digging for days after they had found the last survivor. I remember the flags starting to appear all over, supported by full page cut outs in the mass media. I also remember that the wind shifted on the 5th day or so to blow directly up Manhattan.

I remember that all the reports, from the EPA, all the media, were that the air wasn't dangerous. No need to evacuate lower Manhattan. Nobody seemed to worry much about the folks in Brooklyn. Some Manhattanites I knew left anyway, but not many - even though we knew that the asbestos, jet fuel, and bizarre chemical mixes in the air couldn't be as harmless as we were being told. If you look at the much hyped photo of firefighters raising the flag on the site of the wreckage, you will see they're not wearing masks.

New York City had already been in an economic slump, with most of the rest of the nation also in recession. Apparently the EPA's priority was to make sure that the stock market could re-open.

The big lesson of the day was that the U.S. government didn't make it much of a priority to protect us from great harm. Apparently Malcolm X was right that chickens do, in fact, sometimes come home to roost. Another lesson was that the government is not only incompetent, but that it will lie to the people, even at the cost of thousands of agonizing deaths of brave and patriotic citizens, to protect "order" and profit. And now the news reports begin to quietly stream past, of the sudden deaths and long pulmonary illnesses suffered by the would-be-rescuers. And I wonder if anyone will write the follow-ups, about the less-blatant but still fatal exposures of ordinary folks who made the mistake of breathing in the grey wind, who maybe posted their cut-out flags on their windows, when they should have been evacuating with the help of cut-out evacuation maps.

And I wonder if we can draw the parallels to what is going to happen as the energy crisis, global warming, economic collapse begins to really hit, here in NYC, where we still feel like the center of the world. Parallels to the the heroic and sadly-ill-considered bravery of the few, the confused inaction of the many, the government deceptions, and the impact of reality landing on our heads.


http://www.counterpunch.org/orkin02062006.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/05/nyregion/06reportcnd.html?hp&ex=1157515200&en=f57ac695af0fde43&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Many 9/11 Workers Have Lung Issues, Report Says
By MARIA NEWMAN
Published: September 5, 2006
In the largest study so far of post-9/11 health problems, almost 70 percent of workers who helped with the cleanup of the World Trade Center site suffered new or worsened respiratory symptoms, researchers at Mount Sinai Medical Center found.